Friday, January 9, 2009

Day 9: A little bit of sugar

One component of Sensory Processing Disorder is difficulty with social skills. Karis struggles with understanding the ins and outs of friendships with children her own age, maybe because she feels things so acutely that she sometimes imagines insult where none was intended. It makes things even more difficult now that her best friend H. is living with us and Karis tends to want to play with just H. to the exclusion of all others, including (and especially!) my youngest daughter Quinn, and she expects H. to feel the same way. Today Quinn was napping when Karis and H. got home from school so the two of them had a solid hour to play as a twosome but when Quinn woke up I asked them to think of a game all three could play. (NOTE: Having an odd number of girls together to play is almost never a good idea. There's always an odd girl out.) H. was willing but Karis was not and ended up crying in her bedroom, thinking H. was mad at her. Nothing I could say would convince her otherwise. Another friend came over to play unexpectedly and three of the four girls went out to play on the trampoline, leaving Karis alone inside the house because she didn't want to jump on the trampoline. She loves to cook so I offered to cook something with her to help ease the pain a bit and she chose Fancy Pink Fairy Cocoa from her Fairy Cookbook. It was actually quite good once I got over the sugar overdose. And look - she's almost smiling!